Aedmorn sat opposite to the one who had brought him there; how long it had been he could not properly say, for it felt as long as a heartbeat, as short as an age and an age.

Even the place did not feel right, a place of long shadows as solid as a fleeting mist, as ephemeral as a rock. He could feel no life there; not just an absence of it, but of it having never been. Death had not visited the place; it was beyond such things as that, a realm marked on no maps. If any knew of it he had not heard tell.

The one who ruled over the place was much as their realm, a shadowy thing of indistinct form, ever changing and yet neither dead nor alive either. Vague it appeared, for none could say exact what it was, nor its shape or form.

“Your fool companion seeks to find you,” it said, its voice an echo within an echo within an echo.

Aedmorn laughed, the sound such a foreign thing in a place of no colour, no sound. “Did I not warn you thus?” he said. “You have made a grave mistake.”

“Never have I made a mistake.”

“I count three at least. First you brought me to this place. Second you alerted Ivkarha to it. And third you have not released me when you had the chance. You do not know her like I. She will never give up her search. She will find her way here. And then she shall make you pay.”

“Fool. Do you think that she can do aught to me here, where even gods fear to tread?”

“You may be surprised,” Aedmorn replied, a wry smile appearing upon his face. He rose and glanced around. “I think I shall go now.”

“There I no where to go.”

“But I shall go nonetheless.” He strode off, into the shadows, leaving behind the thing that lurked. Full well he knew that should it desire it could end him, and he had bearded the dragon in it’s very lair, inviting such a response. Yet he knew it would not, for it was restrained by. No by curiosity or by pity, no, but by much deeper reasons as its actions had bound the two together in that place. Death could not reach it and so death could not claim him, not alone. The beast would have to sacrifice to harm Aedmorn, and it could not.

There were shapes in the shadows, Aedmorn found, hints of the true thing without being so. Hills drifted in the distance, and streams flowed, but they were not of water, but merely the shadows of the thing. In no true direction did he walk, for such a thing did not exist; he walked simply to walk. Timeless was that walk as the shadows rolled on by, the shapes of things not truly present, a walk of a moment.

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He was not sure as the exact how he came to be in that accursed place of grey where nothing existed, only lingered. There had been a chamber, and old pottery within which were held parchments sealed with wax. Had they opened them? Had the peruse their contents? He could not recall. All that stood out was the descending shadow that sort to envelop them, to extinguish light. A struggle, but with whom? No Ivkarha, no. Another. Then blackness, only to emerge here, in the realm of melancholic shadows and darkness.

A whisper in the shadows, a soft sigh and still he walked on, walking not for a destination that could not exist; only walking. Heavy were the shadows, and heavy the thoughts that they brought to bear upon him, thoughts of despair that wormed away at him, seeking purchase; his steps began to feel heavy, to slow. Shoulders dropped and his head head sunk forward.

Why did he walk? It was pointless. There was nothing to be had from it, no destination to reach, a walk that would last an eternity, and longer still, never ending, never arriving. Better to admit to defeat, to surrender, to end it.

It could all be over quick, if he so desired it. The voice whispered in his mind, soft and subtle as the shadows. Simply lay down, to allow the shadows to take him, to sleep, to dream.

He stumbled, almost falling, lost in a daze, only to be shaken out of it by the misstep. It had felt like he had tripped upon an unseen item, yet how could that be for there had been nothing real to be seen in all the realm, nothing solid.

The whispers remained still, nagging at him, seeking to slink in, to weaken resolve and thought again, an insidious, relentless assault. He shook his head, eyes hardening as he sort to fight it off, to steel his will to resist. It could last but a while, for all that time did not dwell in the realm, for it could work away at him for an age and an age, as the running waters did upon a mighty mountain, reducing them grain by grain until it was no more

With a cut off snarl, he turned about, to gaze upon the ground, as it were, to see what had been there that had caught his foot. Shadows like mists flowed across it, shrouding vision and so he inched forward, sweeping his foot across his path.

There. His boot bumped into something hidden, something solid. Something that should not be. He knelt and stretched forth his hand, and lo, his fingers closed upon an item, a hilt. They wrapped around it and drew forth the item; a sword emerge forth from the shadows, and they dropped from it. Long it was, and gleamed in the gloom, double edged and sharp. Across its length rippled colour like an aurora in the nights sky, and in it’s hilt was set a stone of the palest green, within which Aedmorn could feel the faintest flicker of life, life where none should be. An impossible blade it was in more ways than one, that it should be in the first place, and that it should exist there.

He raised it high and gazed upon it and as he did all doubts and fears were driven forth and the whispers fell silent. Here was a weapon that even the beast would fear.